


For What Reason

by HellHathPie986



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2018-07-08
Packaged: 2019-06-07 11:32:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15218246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HellHathPie986/pseuds/HellHathPie986
Summary: I'm disappointed with the lack of fanfic fan theories about Shiro's stay with the Galra, so I started writing my own





	1. Captured

Ever since he was a little kid, Takashi Shirogane had dreamt of going to space. He remembered having a collection of toy space crafts and all of his action figures were either astronauts or secret agent astronauts. He joined the Galaxy Garrison as one of the youngest in his class and sailed through all of his subjects with excellent grades. Everyone chalked up his success to his genetics and some predetermined phenomena when in truth, he found the coursework to be very difficult. Nevertheless, he refused to give in and pushed himself to graduate summa cum laude. After that, his pilot license was basically handed to him on a silver platter and soon enough he found himself as the leading candidate for pilot on the Kerberos mission.

Samuel Holt was head of one of the divisions responsible for field work on the research of extraterrestrial life. After primitive life forms had been discovered on one of Saturn’s moons, Titan, it was a race to find suitable habitations for further space exploration. Human colonies were beginning crop up on places such as Mars, Titan, and Europa, and from there it was only natural to leave the solar system entirely. Kerberos was a strong candidate as the final outpost before explorers plunged into open space, and Samuel’s team was to be the first to compile scientific data on the surface of Pluto’s moon.

When he left for his mission, his parents hugged him goodbye and made him promise to stay safe. He’d laughed and told them he trusted the Garrison to build a capable spaceship. Keith had nearly tackled him to the ground, voice cracking, forcing back tears and demanding he come back in one piece. He’d smiled and told him not to worry. After all, what kind of big brother would he be if he didn’t? His friends joked with him, making him swear to tell them if aliens exist and whether or not all of them really did have big eyes, giant heads, and skinny limbs. He told them he’d update his instagram with selfies of him and the little green men. On the many months it took to journey across the solar system, his mind wandered back to these goodbyes several times. He missed everyone back on Earth, but it wasn’t until he was staring in awe at an approaching alien ship that he finally appreciated all of the pleasant adieus. He was happy to know he had so many caring people in his life, and he knew it was too soon to make those farewells the last they would ever exchange.

He’d been in an earthquake once as a child, though he didn’t remember much about it. He was in school, the ground shook and everyone had glanced between each other in confusion until someone piped up and reminded everyone to get near a wall or in a doorway. Shiro looked first to Samuel, then to Matt who both returned his bewildered stare.

“What is that, seismic activity?” Samuel mused, mostly to himself. He didn’t seem particularly bothered, but then again this man didn’t seem to have a fearful bone in his body. For his line of work and physique, it wasn’t an immediate conclusion anyone jumped to, but the man was a regular Evel Knievel when it came to science. But Shiro knew when it came down to it, they were just three men stranded at the edge of the solar system with nothing but a single ship on a deserted moon.

“We should head back to the ship.” He offered, considering if they had to make a fast getaway out of the Plutonian orbit, it was better to actually be near the ship. However, nothing in his years of Garrison training prepared him for what was approaching.

Matt was the first to speak, breaking the other two out of their stupor as he voiced the exact same thought running through their minds. “W-what is that?”

No one was willing to accept what their eyes were seeing, after all, wouldn’t something this big or this advanced have been noticed before? Wouldn’t they had been briefed on alien sightings before voyaging to the edge of the system? It’s not like they had come unannounced, a dozen probes before them had graced Pluto and there was even a man made satellite currently orbiting the planet as well.

“It can’t be!”

But it was. And Shiro couldn’t help hoping they were friendly. Or better yet, completely unaware of the earthlings’ existences. Maybe this enormous ship was just passing by on a distant route, simply grazing the outskirts of the sun’s orbit en route to some other far off destination. Besides, what would such an advanced looking race want with a bunch of simple Earth scientists? It was obvious they were seriously out classed in scientific discovery, the ship had no reason to even distinguish their puny vessel from the surrounding rocks. They were on a mission to collect ice samples on a barren moon, so of course there was nothing to fear.

That is, until Shiro noticed a light near the bow of the ship. It looked as if it was charging for whatever reason, as if about to fire some kind of sci-fi laser beam.

Shiro’s eyes widened.

“Run!” He grabbed Matt’s arm and tugged, pulling him away from his thoughts. “Come on, run!”

Matt looked on to him in confusion whereas Samuel seemed to agree they were in a great deal of danger. All three turned and ran as fast as they could, knowing there was no easy way out and that they were about to die without a single explanation as to how. The Garrison would lose contact and never know the truth of what happened on their mission. Perhaps this moon was part of a territory and the three of them were trespassing. Now they were about to be killed without a single attempt at contact? What if another mission was launched to Kerberos? Would that crew be killed as well?

The purple light was growing closer and soon enough, Shiro’s vision was flooded with purple. His heart raced so fast it was beating in his throat. This wasn’t right, he wasn’t meant to die here! His mission wasn’t meant to end so soon, not after everything he’d accomplished and desired to accomplish. Kerberos was the first step of galactic exploration and he’d be damned if he couldn’t witness the evolution of space travel. He braced for what he assumed was going to be the end and instead he was engulfed in a feeling of weightlessness. Shiro opened his eyes when he noticed he’d clenched them shut and realized the purple light was still completely surrounding him. A hundred questions ran through his head and most of them were answered when he glanced down at the ground. A yelp of surprise escaped his mouth when he realized the laser was actually more of a tractor beam and he along with the Holts were being forcibly dragged through the thin atmosphere towards the enormous alien ship.

Shiro looked up at the source, for the first time knowing what it felt like to be completely at the mercy of another. Somewhere in the back of his mind was an inkling of hope that the situation was nothing more than a misunderstanding and he and the father son science team would be set free in no time. However, the rational part of his brain had been completely overrun with trepidation. There was no definitive evidence for malicious intent, but something was gnawing at his survival instincts to find a way out of this situation.

The purple light grew brighter and brighter the closer the three were brought to the ship until there was nothing but purple. And as suddenly as the massive ship had appeared, the purple light vanished and the three men were dropped, sprawling across the floor when the tractor beam was no longer keeping them afloat. Shiro groaned, attempting to sit up only to realize he was being held down by some unseen weight. He rolled onto his back, attempting to remove the weight but instead he found nothing. Shiro blinked in confusion, feeling as if he was back in an advanced karate class when his master had given him weighted training clothes for practice.

He suddenly heard a yelp of terror and found Matt lying prone on the ground with a giant purple alien standing over him with a foot pressing down on the middle of his back.

“Get away from my son!” Samuel called out, seeming to forget he still had his helmet on. The space suits would transmit communication between each other, but there wasn’t much of a reason for the Garrison to design something that allowed them to speak with any kind of outside entity. To the aliens, the demand was muffled at best.

Naturally, Shiro had never seen these people before, but he knew a warrior when he saw one. This alien was built as a fighter and looked like it could easily take all of them in a brawl without breaking so much as a sweat. It spoke as well, but Shiro couldn’t understand. The language was guttural and sounded menacing, and the helmet didn’t help, but it sounded as if it was demanding something. It spoke again, sounding like it wasn’t happy to repeat itself and when none of the Earthlings answered it delivered a swift kick into Matt’s side. He cried out in pain and Shiro found himself jumping to his feet against the heavy pull of the artificial gravity.

“Leave him alone!” Shiro warned, taking up a fighting stance. The alien grinned and before he had a chance to react, his felt a fist in his gut and his head smacking into the ground. He blinked and found the stranger kneeling over him, fiddling with the clasps of his helmet.

“W-wait, don’t!” But it was too late, the seal broke with a hiss and Shiro attempted to hold his breath. He heard a chuckle from the alien just before a massive fist slammed into his chest and he let out a gasp of surprise. Fresh air filled his lungs, his first worry being that he might suffocate from this alien atmosphere, but the air was crisp and pleasant aside from the strong smell of dog he assumed was coming from the hairy purple alien.

Shiro coughed a few times before the front of his suit was seized in the massive grip of the alien as it spoke once more. The same unfamiliar language met his ears, but this time it sounded like a different question. When Shiro didn’t respond, he was shoved back onto the ground and the alien called out something to someone else. Another approached with a box and the first creature rifled through, procuring a syringe with a rather long looking needle and a vial.

Shiro froze when the alien turned toward him, his eyes widening with fear as the purple creature knelt down and reached out with its free hand, holding Shiro’s head against the floor and using two fingers to force open his left eye.

“Get away from him!”

“Shiro, run! Get away! Get away!”

He heard the muffled calls of his fellow crew members from the helmet that had been discarded to his side, but he couldn’t move a single muscle. His own brain screamed for him to run, to fight, to just do something, but instead he laid on his back and watched as the needle came closer to his eye. He heard one of the scientists scrambling against the floor, probably Matt, only to be subdued by one of the aliens. The two of them continued shouting as the needle disappeared behind his eye and Shiro finally seemed to realize his peril when he felt the needle sink into the fleshy parts between the inner ends of his orbital bones. The pain that followed was unreal as the alien depressed the plunger entirely and released the tincture inside of his skull. With all of his might he shoved the creature away and attempted to stumble to his feet only to collapse as he held his throbbing left eye.

Blood and involuntary tears dripped between his fingers as he took short quick breaths. The alien chuckled again, but this time when it spoke, he understood.

“It’s amazing that such a primitive race could accomplish space travel so far away from home. How long did it take you to get out here? Seven movements? An entire Deca-phoeb?” More laughing followed the alien’s questioning, but Shiro could only stare perplexedly. The alien cut off his fit of laughter when he realized the other was only staring in utter confusion. He snarled and resumed his terrifying persona.

“I am Commander Koratz, leader of the Delrusian fleet under the command of Emperor Zarkon of the Galra Empire. I am in charge of scouting systems Z6R, G9V, and X9Y, and you three are hereby placed under arrest for an interrogation hearing.” 

Shiro blinked, still not entirely sure why he could suddenly understand the other. He figured it had something to do with the syringe, but still. He wondered how he and the others were possibly going to survive this ordeal, let alone ever get back to Earth. And now they were under arrest?

“Under what grounds are you arresting us?” He heard himself say and damn near kicked himself for his tone. The Galra commander smirked.

“You can ask Emperor Zarkon yourself.”

~0~

Is this fanfic just an excuse to write about Shiro getting the snot kicked out of him? A little. Also I just really want to write more about his emotional state because it's very obvious that he's a lot more vulnerable than the series lets on and has a lot more feelings that I wish were more present. Dude's been through a lot. He could really use a group therapy session... Also this fic will dig into why I think Shiro was picked for experimentation. I mean, he's gorgeous, but I don't think Zarkon's heart went doki doki when he was found on some tiny little moon. Face it, Shiro, you're beautiful but not all that special. So I'm exploring the possible reasons as to why some simple Earth kid was kidnapped and held captive by the universe's most menacing dictator


	2. Zarkon

Shiro wasn’t one to go down without a fight. That being said, he was beginning to regret his choice of actions. When his hands were being bound behind his back, instead of complying he ended up spinning around and shoving his elbow into the Galra’s teeth. Another had then tried to subdue him only to receive a right hook to his jaw followed by a left hook to his eye. He wasn’t entirely sure what he was attempting to accomplish, but it seemed like a better idea than possibly meeting this Zarkon guy.

However mightily he struggled though, in the end he was outnumbered and overpowered. Shiro groaned in displeasure as he was forced to walk down a hallway by either heavily clad soldiers or highly intelligent robots. His ribs ached and his ankle was making odd popping sounds, but it seemed as if the Galra had spared his face.

“For whatever reason our scanners picked up on some trace signal out here in the middle of nowhere. All sources seem to indicate you and your crew, but I couldn’t even begin to imagine what could possibly be so interesting about fleshy pink creatures still stumbling their way through the space age.” Koratz spat as an insult, obviously very annoyed to have to be the one to deal with the Earthling misfits. Shiro thought over the revelation himself as well and wondered what their ice sample mission could possibly mean to the Galra Empire. From the sound of it, these guys had a sizeable control over possibly an entire galaxy. Maybe even several galaxies.

“Emperor Zarkon wishes to see you, so I suggest being on your best behavior and not making even so much as a sound.” Koratz warned, stopping in front of a large door and waiting for it to be opened. When it was, he stepped inside followed by Shiro, the Holts, and the rest of the Galra soldiers that were escorting them. It looked as if they were on the main deck. Control panels and Galra seated in front of large monitors lined the walls while a main podium was centered in the room overlooking an enormous display of windows. Unfamiliar constellations littered the dark expanse and suddenly Shiro wondered if they were even near Kerberos anymore. 

“Vrepit sa, General Grets.” Koratz greeted, his right hand fisted over his chest. Grets regarded him from the podium and returned the greeting, then immediately shifted his attention to the humans. He stepped down and approached the three, stopping just a few paces short and jutting out his chin. The slight motion was regarded as an order, and the Galra soldiers kicked out the footing of the Earthlings, sending them down onto their knees. Shiro winced at the bruises he’d received not too long ago.

“So, I take it this is the difficult one?” The general asked in a low, malicious tone. Koratz affirmed his suspicious and Grets smiled sinisterly.

“It’s a shame we can’t interrogate him ourselves. I’d love to know why this puny thing is so interesting to Zarkon.”  
Shiro swallowed heavily, knowing it couldn’t be a good thing to be regarded as interesting to any of these people. Grets reached out and took hold of his chin, turning his head from side to side and examining him like an animal that was being led to slaughter. Shiro jerked his head away, feeling as a shiver ran down his spine and hoping Zarkon wasn’t actually on this ship. Grets chuckled lightly, but his mood immediately fell and next thing he knew, Shiro was on the floor again with a sharp sting across his cheek.

“It’s taken every officer in the entire fleet deca-phoebs to gain any kind of recognition from Zarkon, and now he wants a personal audience with some unknown primate species? Some neanderthal that ten thousand years ago was banging rocks together and foraging for bugs?” Grets roared, his temper absolutely getting the better of him as he slammed his foot into Shiro again and again. He reached down and hoisted Shiro up and off of his feet by the collar of his space suit and glared daggers at him.

“As soon as he realizes there’s nothing special about you, that you’re from yet another planet just waiting to be conquered, I’ll kill you myself.” He seethed into Shiro’s face, a bit of spittle being ejected onto his cheek. Shiro glared back and, against his better judgement, spit in the General’s face.

He hardly had a moment to regret his actions before he was left crouched on the floor gasping for breath.

“Sir, Lord Zarkon wishes to speak with you.”

A smack on the back of his head greeted Shiro and he suddenly remembered he wasn’t allowed to make a sound. The beating was causing his vision to go blurry and he hoped the other two weren’t too worried about him. He definitely needed to tone down the defiant prisoner routine though, he didn’t think he’d be able to survive if the Galra became even more angry with him. Now not only was he a misbehaving prisoner, but there was also some kind of political tension going on. It wasn’t his fault, it’s not like Shiro asked to be kidnapped. Whatever Zarkon wanted with him was his own demented intentions and Shiro was happy to be dropped off somewhere far less likely to beat the snot out of him at every chance that was given.

He heard voices and assumed it was General Grets and Zarkon. He slowly lifted his head, hoping to at least see the face of the Galra commander that was so insistent on meeting him.

“Emperor Zarkon, we were scouting system X9Y as ordered when we found these primitive scientists. I don’t think they know anything useful.”

Shiro heard the shift of tone in the Galra’s voice, trying to persuade his leader to leave the Earthlings to himself. On one hand, with Grets he knew what he was dealing with. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d have to put a bully in his place. On the other hand, Zarkon was probably the only thing keeping him alive. However, he wasn’t sure that was entirely a good thing to rely on. Afterall, what if the guy had some weird plan? Or what if there was going to be alien experimentation? He knew he was drawing all of his knowledge on aliens from Hollywood, but that didn’t mean they were entirely invalid.

“Take them back to the main fleet for interrogation. The Druids will find out what they know.”

Shiro balked, not at all liking the tone of voice. “Please! We come from a peaceful planet, we mean you no harm.” He tried to reason, but knew he’d made a mistake in speaking. “We’re unarmed!” He tried to continue, to hopefully reason with the others that there really was nothing special about him and his crew and that he was willing to forget everything if they let him go. However, the Galra were not impressed and with a swift slam in the back of the head with the butt of a gun, Shiro was out like a light.


End file.
